Fixin' Leaks and Leeks

When the skies overhead look like kraken ooze and the wind howls like a banshee chasing a bobcat through the neighborhood, I like to gather the Fixin’ Leaks and Leeks Team and DIY my own ghost story.

I do it every year in October. This makes year number six? I’ve lost count. In any case, the DIY ghost story is cheap, easy, and fun—and almost anyone can do it. And you can choose which friend or family member loses a shirt. (Spoiler alert: It’s always Nate in my stories. He’s such a good sport.)

This year’s story (“The Smell from Hell”) is based on a true event. For the past week, our refrigerator has smelled like something fiendishly foul. The angst, the horror, the wild accusations we threw at one another were like something out of a poltergeist movie. We still don’t know if it’s gone for good, or if it’ll come back, but in the meantime, please enjoy:

The Smell from Hell

Just as ice from a hailstorm unleashes its wrath across the roof and windows of the Fixin’ Leaks and Leeks Headquarters, Nate decides to rake leaves. Cecilia imagines him getting pelted and asks, “Won’t that hurt?” to which he replies, “Nah.” Two minutes later, Cecilia discovers he’s standing under the roof on the front doorstep, determined to wait it out, but the storm won’t let up, so he comes back inside with an empty trash bag. Cecilia fills it with dirty old shoes she keeps tripping over in the closet that no one’s wearing anymore—and that no one would want to wear now.

The lights flicker, and Alex comes home from campus.

“Am I too late for dinner? I stayed late after physics class.”

“Nope, you’re not late—just reach into the fridge there and grab the lettuce. We’ll make a salad first,” Cecilia says.

The lights flicker on and off again as Alex reaches for the refrigerator door handle. Then, a mysterious green gas escapes from inside, filling the kitchen. The furnace kicks on, and the vents suck in the greenish light, sending it throughout the house.

“Oh! That is awful!” Nate says.

“What could possibly be in here?” Cecilia asks.

Cecilia, Nate, and Alex open old containers of sour cream and other mysterious jars and find questionable, furry layers inside.

“I thought I cleaned out the refrigerator before we went to Fiji!”

“I don’t think you did,” Nate says.

“You’re right! I was too busy trying to cram ghost story books into my luggage to soothe my nerves before the flight.”

“Alex, take this container and rinse it out—I’ll get some of these other jars,” Nate says.

Nate removes some of the drawers and finds an eerie substance at the bottom of the refrigerator.

“Get the Windex,” he says.

Meanwhile, the green gas swirls, kicks up into a frenzy.

“I’m thinking the smell should be going away by now,” Alex says.

“It’s not. It’s just getting worse,” Nate says, “and it’s getting late, so we’ll just have to live with the smell until we can figure it out in the morning.”

“Live with the smell?!! Are we animals?”

“It’ll be fine, Cecilia. We’ll get to it in the daylight, when we’re rested.”

During the night, the smells circulate, pulling the Fixin’ Leeks and Leaks Team from their sleep.

“What if it’s not the refrigerator?” Cecilia asks Nate. “What if it’s an animal that crawled under the house and died? What if it’s an evil spirit? A plant that I killed that’s come back for revenge by rotting under our foundation. Has the toilet gone rogue?”

“I’ll go through the crawlspace tomorrow.”

“But your back!”

“Okay, you can go through the crawlspace tomorrow.”

“But my back!”

“Okay, we’ll sacrifice Alex to the crawlspace tomorrow. He’s young and strong.”

Meanwhile, Alex forgets that there’s a horrible odor and opens the refrigerator door during the middle of the night to fix himself a snack. The floors rattle, and the stench intensifies.

“Is it a rotting banana? Did something fall behind the refrigerator? Maybe it’s a piece of raw chicken or fish?” Cecilia asks in desperation.

Rubbing their eyes, the Fixin’ Leaks and Leeks Team goes back downstairs in the morning. Nate opens the closet to the crawlspace and gives Alex directions on how to navigate, calling to him, “Do you see anything? A rat? A nest of snakes? Sewage?”

And Alex replies, “No, nothing. There’s nothing down here.”

He comes back up covered in dirt, but Cecilia’s grateful to see he’s still alive—and that nothing is in the crawlspace or under the house.

“Then that means it’s still the refrigerator,” Nate says. “I’m going to pull it away from the wall.”

“No—it’s too dangerous,” Cecilia says. “Look, there’s this company that specializes in smells. I should just call them. Let them investigate.”

“Absolutely not. I can do this.”

Nate straightens his back, stands tall. Cecilia can see the shape of his pecks rippling through the tight red “Spicy Sriracha Hot Chili Sauce” T-shirt he’s wearing.

“Okay, but wait—”

“What is it?

“You’re getting sweaty.”

“So?”

“You may need to remove your shirt.”

Nate rolls his eyes, then rips off his shirt, shreds of it hanging from his biceps and abs.

As he pulls the refrigerator from the wall, an eerie voice thunders from the cabinets above: “You shall not disturb the smells from within!”

A rancid, gamey odor overtakes the kitchen, as Nate looks behind and under the refrigerator.

“Nothing,” he says. “There’s nothing there.”

Cecilia sinks to the floor, sobbing, shaking her fists at the sky. “Why? Why do we have to live with this smell? What have we done to deserve this?”

Nate waves his arms wildly through the air, and the green mist starts to dissipate.

“I know just what I’ll do he says. Get the coffee grounds!”

“Coffee grounds?”

“They’ll absorb the odor.”

“So the smell is still there, just absorbed by the coffee grounds?”

“As long as we keep replenishing them.”

Alex gets out the coffee bean grinder and turns the coffee beans into powder.

Plates of coffee ground offerings go into the refrigerator, and the smoke begins to clear. As long as the Fixin’ Leaks and Leeks Team continues to feed an offering of coffee grounds to the refrigerator, the smell dissipates, Alex can go out with friends, and Nate can scoop Cecilia up into his arms and run with her through the hail, happily ever after. The end.

Your Turn: What’s your favorite ghost story? OR: If the walls could talk, what stories would they tell about you?